A dash cam is an onboard camera that continuously records a view through a front window of a vehicle, and continuously records segments for a unit time and stores the segments through an onboard SD memory card.
The dash cams have become more popular particularly in most countries of Asia and Russia, and people install dash cams in their vehicles to protect them from accidents. Because video proofs that cannot be refuted may be acquired from traffic accident events. For example, the insurance companies provide discounts as an insurance policy if the users install dash cams in their vehicles to recommend the uses of the dash cams.
The dash cams have potential capabilities of using silent observers of other accidents. For example, the police requests submittal of a dash cam captured at a specific accident site and if the accident is verified, provides a reward. However, people hesitate to provide a dash cam video because their location histories may be exposed, while their privacies are not guaranteed. This is because the users desire to protect their location privacies unlike that the police desire to verify the locations and times of the DCVs. Accordingly, an automation process for verifying the locations and times of DCVs while the anonymity of the users are guaranteed is required.
For the related technologies, many studies on verification of location as well as location privacy have been made, and the existing location verification technique aims to discover the location of a user or determine the legitimacy of the location of the user. The existing location verification technique verifies location in various schemes. For example, location is verified by using ultrasonic communication or using multi-lateralization through an intra-structure, such as a base station or sensor nodes, or a directional antenna. However, the methods verify a location of the user, and the location privacy of the user is not guaranteed.
Further, the existing location privacy method is focused in hiding the identity of the user while using a location based service. The existing location privacy method realizes location privacy by using various schemes, such as k-anonymity, a mixed zone, or a predictable privacy. However, the existing location privacy method may protect the location history of the user, but it is difficult to apply the method to verification of location.
Further, as a possible method for protecting the location privacy of the user, there is a method for anonymously submitting a DCV including GPS based location and time information. However, according to the method, because the GPS information may be easily faked, the actual location and time of the submitted DCV cannot be verified.
Accordingly, the necessity of a measure for verifying the time and location of image data of a camera for a vehicle, such as a DCV while guaranteeing the anonymity of the user has risen.